Modding on the Spectrum

The last three weeks have been very stressful again. Not only did two family magazines have to be completed, but I also had to take over the work of the colleague who the boss had recently fired. To make matters worse, as you may already know, I was very sleep deprived.

In order to get at least a little more sleep, I spent another week at my mum's to work in her flat. The week before last, I worked 5 hours on Saturday and 5 hours on Sunday to catch up on the work that had been left undone during the days of extreme sleep deprivation (in some cases, I only made progress at a snail's pace). By last week Thursday, I had to have entered all the data from the event organisers (I take care of the event calendars for the family magazines). The highest number was 49 e-mails of varying lengths (from 1 page to over 20 pages). To cut a long story short: despite the stress, I managed to enter all the events in the events calendar.

To recover a little, I asked my boss for a day off, which I wanted to take last Friday. However, as I was needed on Friday for queries regarding the corrections, I took this Monday off instead. It was actually good that I had the day off on Monday, because then I had another day to get used to my own bed again (I wasn't back home until Sunday evening) and my ‘dear’ neighbour.

Only one family magazine has to be finished next month (the publishing house produces three family magazines; two are published in one month and the third in the following month). Let's see if this production is less stressful.

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Happy Birthday!

We should have thrown a party. Never pass up an excuse for a party!

And so my birthday comes to an end. It was an eventful day. I had a sushi bowl for breakfast. Then I played Starfield for a few hours. In the afternoon, my buddy picked me up and we drove to the restaurant. The food was good and very plentiful. I didn't finish it all and had the rest wrapped up (I'll probably eat it for breakfast tomorrow). After dinner we went shopping. On the way back to the car, we saw a guy writing down the license plate number of my buddy's car. My buddy and I had forgotten to put the parking disk inside. Luckily the guy was lenient and we didn't have to pay a fee (which would have been 25 euros). It happened when we were pulling out of the parking space: my buddy turned the steering wheel too early and briefly hit the steel pillar. We got off with a scare. There were "only" scratches in the car's paintwork and a small hole in the mudguard. To calm ourselves down, we later watched a funny movie on streaming, Dolittle with Robert Downey Jr. in the lead role.

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We now have 100 members! Let's celebrate


I went to the store where I bought the monitor and replaced it with a flawless one. I was allowed to check the new model for pixel errors in the store. It's a good thing that I took out insurance for the device at the time, because the normal warranty would not have covered the defect.

I decided to stay with my mum for a few days longer.

It was only today that I noticed the dead pixel at the top right of the screen of the new monitor when I was watching a video. Now I'm wondering whether I should exchange the monitor for another model or live with it. If I decide to replace it, I run the risk that the other device will also be faulty. How common are dead pixels? Or should I return the monitor and buy a slightly more expensive model instead (hoping that the other manufacturer has better quality control)? The original price of the monitor was around 100 euros (it was on sale and cost around 20 euros less). I bought this monitor, a Philips. I'm glad that my main monitor at home, an ASUS, doesn't have any dead pixels.

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Because of my neighbour, I have temporarily moved my home office to my mother's flat. It always gets stressful in the middle of the month as far as my work is concerned. This is because all the data we receive from event organisers has to be entered into the event calendar by a deadline. I was normally in my home office during this time. I haven't been able to work in my flat for several months because of the constant noise pollution. That's why I now work almost exclusively in the office and very rarely work from home. Now my work in the office is also in danger because I hardly get any sleep (because the neighbour has also been making noise at night for some time). My mother's neighbours are also loud, but I'm not so badly triggered by their noise and they are mostly quiet at night. As long as the situation at my home doesn't change (or as long as I don't have a new flat), I'll probably visit her more often and do my work in her flat.

I asked her if I was burdening her with this, but she denied it. She said I was her daughter and that she was my tower of strength. I was very touched by this.

Today we bought a monitor and a keyboard to make my work easier (the screen of my work notebook is quite small). She might also use the monitor when I'm away (Edit: She has decided against it). Then I won't have to set everything up and take it down all the time.


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Happy birthday, Altbert!

And to you Selene, and every one here as well. Happy New Year

May it bring us all peace and happiness

I hope you have all had a good start to the new year, or are having a good start to the new year. I wish you all the best for 2025!


Happy birthday, ScytheBearer!

Avrie wrote: ↑Fri Dec 27, 2024 12:54 pm And to you as well Selene

Thank you

Avrie wrote: ↑Fri Dec 27, 2024 12:54 pmMay the new year at least bring you peaceful sleep

I hope so.